R for 'responsibility' – and womanhood

I was wondering when the Big Day would be – the one that I would realise I was now a Woman. I think it happened on Saturday. I went to a shopping centre to buy some clothes for the weddings I’ve been invited to next month and, it’s a first, I found nearly straight away things that I liked and that fitted me! And when I looked in the mirror, I told myself: ‘My God, I look like a woman!’

Thirty seconds later, my husband came in the changing rooms and said ‘Wow! You look like a woman! It’s really nice!’

I was shocked.

If we had both come to the same conclusion, then surely, it meant that it really was true: I had ‘suddenly’ become a woman! Scary thought, but at the same time, a welcome realisation.

On a slightly different subject, these clothes I tried on, they were all the same size: 14! I hadn’t tried on a size 14 item of clothing that fitted me for a looonnnnng time! It sure felt good, and I decided there and then that the little experiment I had started on Tuesday 14 August, just a few days before, was definitely worth pursuing, because this is how I wanted to be and this is how I wanted to feel – every day.

Yes, last Tuesday, I had a ‘a-ah moment’, as Oprah would say. I woke up and it was really like something had changed within me and so things would change on the outside as well. I just had had enough of not taking care of me, of not looking after me in the right way. I had had enough of not leading the life that I want to lead: one where I am not stressed, one where there is no tension in my back or shoulders, one where pretty much every day is easy, where I’m relaxed and happy with everything that I do, even if it’s the washing-up or the shopping. But most of all, the life that I want is a life where I am a responsible woman, one who is an adult and who looks after herself accordingly, as any normal responsible adult does. This is something I haven’t done properly, ever. Now, I think I’ve reached that point of no return: I’m an adult, I’m a woman, and therefore I will look after myself properly.

This implies looking after myself food-wise as well, of course. Well, mainly, that’s what this a-ah moment was all about: ‘I’m going to be responsible and therefore eat just what I need, no more, no less.’

And so ladies, that’s when I started counting points, the good old Weight Watchers way! Gasp! This was not a diet, no no. I must say, the next day, I wasn’t entirely convinced, and I just wanted to stop thinking about points and what I would eat next, and so I thought ‘Sod that, of course this isn’t going to work, you know you can’t do diets!’ But the day after that, I was all relaxed again, like I normally am when I do IE (I don’t think about food, I just wait for hunger to call and tell me ‘Time to eat!’) And somehow, it was all natural to count my points and to stop when I had reached what I believed to be a comfortable number of points. Roughly 6-7 in the morning, about 8 for lunch and 6-7 for dinner, with snacks no more than 2.

It’s just that this way, you see, I can’t fool myself any more. With IE, it’s so easy to eat more (in terms of calories as well as in terms of quantity) than you think you are or than you is actually respectable/reasonable, because you’re not supposed to have any restrictions whatsoever, you’re supposed to ‘go for it’ until you’re full. But so often, you go beyond your fullness. And I realised that if after all this time I still don’t know what an appropriate portion is for me, then I can try to see what WW recommend (I vaguely remembered, for having followed the WW programme in 1999, and then again, but on my own, in 2003) and base my meals on this. And so far, it’s working!

Of course, I still apply all the IE principles – eat what I want, when I want it, eat consciously and slowly, stop when I’m full (surprisingly, sometimes I get full even before I finish my plate, despite not having eaten all ‘my points’!). It’s just that when I’m tempted to eat more, just for the sake of it, I am strongly reminded that, well, ‘it all counts’ (whereas when I do just IE, it’s so easy to think ‘One more won’t hurt’, and therefore ‘Three more won’t hurt’ and so on!). And so if I really want to feel better and look after myself properly and not have knees that hurt and not have big arms that hurt when I sleep on my side at night and fit into nice clothes (among many other reasons), then it’s better if I stop being tempted and get on with my life. Because I know, for sure now, that this temptation is nothing more than habit – the-size-of-my-stomach habit, and also the finger-to-mouth habit (and of course, the old ‘I’ll show you’ habit, as a rebellion against my parents or society).

However, the day I’ll need to binge, I will not hold back. As with IE, I’ll try to find out why; and if, as with IE, I can’t find the answer or I can’t be bothered to look for it long enough, well, I’ll have my binge and, just like with IE, I will not feel guilty. And the next day, I’ll just start afresh.

Ladies, I have, somehow, found a way of combining IE with WW!!! All I had to do was, the first two days, tell myself that I was doing this for me and that it was just a way of helping me think a bit more about the quantities that I eat. Just a way of being more focused, of paying even more attention, and for longer. Just a way of preparing smaller portions. Indeed, I know that the quantities I normally put on my plate are too big, and that then I find it hard to stop. I also find it hard, during ‘IE only’ times, to prepare little and to put little on my plate, because I feel like I am only ‘pretending’ and know full well that there is a high chance I will go back for more anyway, so what’s the point, I might as well put the full portion on the plate, even if that means I stop before I finish it all. And of course, more often than not, I eat it all.

Now the difference is this: I prepare what I know is enough – intellectually, but also thanks to more than 10 years of learning how to eat (I am now absolutely convinced that we don’t need a lot of food to survive, indeed to live well, and I am utterly convinced that I am the same as everyone else, therefore I don’t need much food!) – and by the end of it, I normally feel that I’m comfortably full and I know that I don’t need any more: I feel fine, I’ve eaten plenty (of course, I wouldn’t lower my ‘points allowance’ to less than 25 – that would really be a diet, and I really believe that 20 points, for example, are just not enough, and if it’s not enough, you rebel even before you get hungry and eat all the ice cream in the freezer and the chocolate bars in the cupboard) and I’ve still eaten what I felt like eating.

Ladies, I am my own guru, I’m doing a little experiment, and so far, so very good! I’m amazed, myself!

I know this may sound like anti-IE, but I thought I would write about it anyway. Who knows, it might inspire someone out there.

Losing faith

I’m not sure why there are so many ups and downs at the moment, but hey ho, I have to ride along and see where it takes me. For the past few days, I have been losing faith in IE and have been wanting to lose weight more than anything.

Why? Because until the age of 18, I was slim – 56kg for 5 ft 4/1m64. Not thin; just normal, nice, slim. Then it all went wrong and I haven't stopped putting on weight since.

Why? Because I hurt my knee a few weeks ago and I’m sure it would heal a lot more quickly if I weighed less.

Why? Because soon my husband and I would quite like to have a baby and if I put even more weight on, it will not be good, either for me or for the baby.

Why? Because I want to be pretty, slim and energetic for my husband, but of course also and primarily for myself.

Why? Because I’ve had enough of not treating myself well enough.

I’ve been doing a lot better in the past couple of years, I have moved on in many areas of my life and I understand things much better. Yet, still, my weight is there, witness to all my other, deeper problems, testimony to the silt that has been moved about and scrutinised, at the expense of weight loss.

The other day, I was going through my photo albums and saw myself at 18, 19, even 25 – I was slimmer. At the time, I thought I was big and ugly and my sole preoccupation was my weight and losing the fat. Yet, I was already quite slim! Even when I put on 6kg, I was still slim!

Now here’s the problem. Time. Things are better, but they take sooooo long!!! What do I need to do to make things go faster? I’m losing patience, which makes me lose faith in the whole system. I know that I'm meant to be slim, that I can go back to being slim. The question is: how exactly? I just want to diet to get that body back. But deep down, I know that this will only lead to more weight gain – won't it?

So I'm sticking to IE, no matter how slow the weight loss, no matter how slow the progress. At least it's (more or less?) certain, more or less for ever – isn't it?